Day One was empowering. I made a list of books I'd like to read and actually found one and spent a good little chunk of time reading it! A couple things, though....
1. Having deleted the Facebook app from my phone, I replaced it with a different app. I probably counted five times that I absently, completely automatically, clicked on that app--Amazon Video, for what it's worth--and no, I had no plans of actually using the app. That little fact was pretty disquieting to me.
2. I felt somewhat isolated as I thought of several witty quips in my mind that I would have otherwise rushed to share to Facebook. True, I didn't get to share those witty quips. I also didn't waste time checking Facebook to see whether anyone had read and responded to my witty quips, or whether said witty quips were not indeed witty.
3. I spent most of the day with my two dearest friends from high school, so I can't say that it was a fair "day two," since I wouldn't have been on Facebook a whole lot anyway. However, I did realize I couldn't post pictures of our children and the group shot of all of us. That fact didn't diminish the joy at having spent the day as I had.
4. I'm greatly looking forward to reading both the books I've selected and having time to enjoy them before bed tonight. Normally I absently scroll through Facebook until I realize I've reached what my husband deems "The End of the Internet' before realizing I have only 15 minutes to read before my targeted bedtime, which usually turns into an hour, a late bedtime, and a crabby me in the morning.
5. Bring on Day 3.
Showing posts with label Facebook free. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Facebook free. Show all posts
Thursday, March 7, 2019
Facebook-free Lent Day 1
I've been talking about giving up Facebook for months, possibly years. Having been in college in the early 2000s, I was "there" when it first began. I heard about it from a couple of friends, got a couple invites, and remember thinking, "Why on earth would I want my "face" on the Internet?" It all seemed very absurd to me. Then my roommate got it, and we could suddenly find out all kinds of information, like whether or not that cute guy in History was single, and what our "friends" would be up to this weekend.
Facebook evolved with us, or possibly rather we with it. I remember being able to post "statuses," which were often the cryptic, emotive type (being a college student and all). A few years later, people could respond to such statuses. Still later, Facebook opened its market to everyone, from high schoolers to boomers and beyond. I remember feeling really conflicted at that development, since Facebook was still a relatively intimate way to connect with people I found to be true friends.
I don't need to expound upon what Facebook has become. We all know it. I feel fortunate that my 6 year old boy still says, "What's Facebook?", rather than being interested in how many likes the picture of his drawing got. I aim to keep it that way as long as possible, but knew that something would need to change in order to make that happen.
In my younger years, I flirted with alcohol consumption. Don't get me wrong, I still enjoy a drink or two here and there and have discovered a casual love of craft brews. What I found around age 21 and 22, though, was that just a drink or two of alcohol took away my social anxiety, improved my fiddle playing, and generally made me more of an interesting person. Or so I thought, until the next day, when I would again worry about the possibility of having said something to someone that maybe wasn't worded exactly how I had "really" meant it.
By the grace of God I didn't ever fully find myself going down that road. I had children now, and it didn't take any experiential discovery to know that parenting with a buzz could only be harder than parenting stone-cold sober.
However, I've always had that realization at the back of my mind that I have an addictive personality (another reason I'm careful about alcohol). Addiction doesn't always take the form of a drug or beverage. It doesn't even have to have the appearance of something sinful. When I started buying baby supplies (cloth diapers, then baby wraps), it was just me, being a mom who loved my child and wanted to find the product that worked best for us. And talking to other moms who wanted the same for their children. And then analyzing and reviewing how each specific product performed in any given situation, realizing this might not be the "best" product after all, and going on the hunt for a new product, which entailed a whole lot more analyzing with my fellow online addicts.
My children having outgrown the cloth diaper stage and mostly outgrown being wrapped, those areas of addiction are being removed out of necessity, much like the potential addiction to alcohol I faced many years ago. But wait....I'm homeschooling! And I see the rabbit hole of curriculum possibilities looming ahead of me. I used to joke that if I became as addicted to baby carriers as I did to cloth diapers that my husband would divorce me. I won't lie, I became even more addicted, and it did cause some serious strain on our marriage. I'm not about to go down that road again with homeschooling curriculum, or my husband might make me send our kids to school!
Anyway, this post was going to be about my Facebook addiction, before I realized in free writing that Facebook wasn't my only problem. I will say that it's the root. I have been a Facebook user since 2004. Wow. I was 20 years old when I started using it, and I'm not 34. I'm not sure about this, but I do know that my struggles with depression and anxiety got worse around this time. It could have been life circumstances, but I do also know that I got "better" around the time I moved away from college (which had been a goal), got my dream job and....(drumroll) didn't have any local Facebook friends. Everyone I knew and interacted with on a daily basis didn't have Facebook at that point (remember, it was still basically just a college thing). I had to actually connect with people in person.
Since then, Facebook has become so much more. I have a smart phone. I'm not sure how I would even go without it, since so much of my life is on it. But Facebook is going to be the devil here, or at least his tool. I see myself depending on it, despite my discomfort with how much I do depend on it. The crazy thing is, is that the people developing it and evolving it know this. Our brains are conditioned by the "ting" of a notification that will either tell us that someone "approved" an aspect of our humanness, or maybe that someone is ready to fight about it. When we hear that "ting" our brains prepare for either of those, or perhaps some other possibility. Maybe someone wants to buy my guitar. Maybe someone thinks my kids are adorable. Maybe someone is going to call me a feminist, anti-woman, anti-American, or a car seat Nazi (all of the above are categories that some people would see me fit into). Maybe someone is having a party and I'm not invited. Why? Did I say something that offended that person? Was it that pro-life article I posted two weeks ago, or the joke bashing Joel Osteen?
All this time, my kids are living their lives, away from the crap that's involved in that aspect of modern life. If there's anything I haven't failed at as a parent, it's letting my kids play creatively and not get sucked in by screens. But if I am addicted to that technology, will that bliss last? I'm already seeing that it won't. If I want my kids to find joy in music, God, animals, the outdoors (not in that order!), shouldn't I model that enjoyment instead of staring at my phone for myriad 5 minute chunks of the day, then complaining that I don't have time to practice my instruments/sew/whatever?
I woke up last night knowing that I wouldn't be checking Facebook for the next 40 days and had a moment of panic. I almost checked it, because it wasn't Ash Wednesday yet at that point, so I could "technically" use it. Luckily that thought offered my mind a moment of clarity and conviction about how important it was that I actually do this!
In closing, my kids are outside playing for the first time in at least a week, since it is a balmy 9 degrees above Fahrenheit. I haven't written anything forever, so this is rambling and poorly written, and I'm aware of that. I'm off to enjoy life and conquer the withdrawals of this Facebook addiction.
Facebook evolved with us, or possibly rather we with it. I remember being able to post "statuses," which were often the cryptic, emotive type (being a college student and all). A few years later, people could respond to such statuses. Still later, Facebook opened its market to everyone, from high schoolers to boomers and beyond. I remember feeling really conflicted at that development, since Facebook was still a relatively intimate way to connect with people I found to be true friends.
I don't need to expound upon what Facebook has become. We all know it. I feel fortunate that my 6 year old boy still says, "What's Facebook?", rather than being interested in how many likes the picture of his drawing got. I aim to keep it that way as long as possible, but knew that something would need to change in order to make that happen.
In my younger years, I flirted with alcohol consumption. Don't get me wrong, I still enjoy a drink or two here and there and have discovered a casual love of craft brews. What I found around age 21 and 22, though, was that just a drink or two of alcohol took away my social anxiety, improved my fiddle playing, and generally made me more of an interesting person. Or so I thought, until the next day, when I would again worry about the possibility of having said something to someone that maybe wasn't worded exactly how I had "really" meant it.
By the grace of God I didn't ever fully find myself going down that road. I had children now, and it didn't take any experiential discovery to know that parenting with a buzz could only be harder than parenting stone-cold sober.
However, I've always had that realization at the back of my mind that I have an addictive personality (another reason I'm careful about alcohol). Addiction doesn't always take the form of a drug or beverage. It doesn't even have to have the appearance of something sinful. When I started buying baby supplies (cloth diapers, then baby wraps), it was just me, being a mom who loved my child and wanted to find the product that worked best for us. And talking to other moms who wanted the same for their children. And then analyzing and reviewing how each specific product performed in any given situation, realizing this might not be the "best" product after all, and going on the hunt for a new product, which entailed a whole lot more analyzing with my fellow online addicts.
My children having outgrown the cloth diaper stage and mostly outgrown being wrapped, those areas of addiction are being removed out of necessity, much like the potential addiction to alcohol I faced many years ago. But wait....I'm homeschooling! And I see the rabbit hole of curriculum possibilities looming ahead of me. I used to joke that if I became as addicted to baby carriers as I did to cloth diapers that my husband would divorce me. I won't lie, I became even more addicted, and it did cause some serious strain on our marriage. I'm not about to go down that road again with homeschooling curriculum, or my husband might make me send our kids to school!
Anyway, this post was going to be about my Facebook addiction, before I realized in free writing that Facebook wasn't my only problem. I will say that it's the root. I have been a Facebook user since 2004. Wow. I was 20 years old when I started using it, and I'm not 34. I'm not sure about this, but I do know that my struggles with depression and anxiety got worse around this time. It could have been life circumstances, but I do also know that I got "better" around the time I moved away from college (which had been a goal), got my dream job and....(drumroll) didn't have any local Facebook friends. Everyone I knew and interacted with on a daily basis didn't have Facebook at that point (remember, it was still basically just a college thing). I had to actually connect with people in person.
Since then, Facebook has become so much more. I have a smart phone. I'm not sure how I would even go without it, since so much of my life is on it. But Facebook is going to be the devil here, or at least his tool. I see myself depending on it, despite my discomfort with how much I do depend on it. The crazy thing is, is that the people developing it and evolving it know this. Our brains are conditioned by the "ting" of a notification that will either tell us that someone "approved" an aspect of our humanness, or maybe that someone is ready to fight about it. When we hear that "ting" our brains prepare for either of those, or perhaps some other possibility. Maybe someone wants to buy my guitar. Maybe someone thinks my kids are adorable. Maybe someone is going to call me a feminist, anti-woman, anti-American, or a car seat Nazi (all of the above are categories that some people would see me fit into). Maybe someone is having a party and I'm not invited. Why? Did I say something that offended that person? Was it that pro-life article I posted two weeks ago, or the joke bashing Joel Osteen?
All this time, my kids are living their lives, away from the crap that's involved in that aspect of modern life. If there's anything I haven't failed at as a parent, it's letting my kids play creatively and not get sucked in by screens. But if I am addicted to that technology, will that bliss last? I'm already seeing that it won't. If I want my kids to find joy in music, God, animals, the outdoors (not in that order!), shouldn't I model that enjoyment instead of staring at my phone for myriad 5 minute chunks of the day, then complaining that I don't have time to practice my instruments/sew/whatever?
I woke up last night knowing that I wouldn't be checking Facebook for the next 40 days and had a moment of panic. I almost checked it, because it wasn't Ash Wednesday yet at that point, so I could "technically" use it. Luckily that thought offered my mind a moment of clarity and conviction about how important it was that I actually do this!
In closing, my kids are outside playing for the first time in at least a week, since it is a balmy 9 degrees above Fahrenheit. I haven't written anything forever, so this is rambling and poorly written, and I'm aware of that. I'm off to enjoy life and conquer the withdrawals of this Facebook addiction.
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